


please don't slow me down if i'm going too fast

by zenelly



Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Blood and Violence, Enemies to Lovers, HunterXHunter Big Bang 2019, I Tried My Best And Therefore I Cannot Be Ridiculed, M/M, aged up characters in general (everyone's ~10 years older than canon), but it is a SEXY spy au so that's what matters, character death warning is for antagonists only, hxhbb19, this is not necessarily a GOOD spy au, well really more like spyrivals to lovers, yeah this is a spy au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-19
Updated: 2020-03-18
Packaged: 2020-05-14 13:38:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19274422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zenelly/pseuds/zenelly
Summary: When the Phantom Troupe starts making a move into human parts trafficking, Spymaster Cheadel sets two of her best agents on the case to take them down. Comprising of the vendetta-driven Kurapika, a known wildcard who doesn’t play well with others, and smooth-talking Leorio, who’s just coming back to the force after the loss of his partner, the global theft ring is only the first of their problems. The second is that Leorio and Kurapika have never once gotten along, and this doesn’t seem like it’s going to change any time soon.But Leorio doesn’t know how to let things go. Not ideas, not opinions, and definitely not people, even when they don’t want to be held onto.None of this goes according to plan.(Written for the Hunter X Hunter Big Bang 2019!)





	1. future tense meets middle finger

**Author's Note:**

> so this is MOSTLY done (mostly) and will be updating hopefully (HOPEFULLY TENTATIVELY) weekly on either tuesdays or wednesdays until it's... done. whenever that is. This is testament, yet again, to my poor planning skills. 
> 
> Thank you so much to Eddy, without whom this fic would not be around because their enthusiasm for this dumb project made me realize that i wasn't doing too badly at it after all ♥♥♥ also their playlist for this fic (LINKED [HERE](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1DwkpEgyM29HPLMB24Vif1) as i have their permission) literally saved my entire life because it fit the mood of this fic better than the one I tried to put together lmao
> 
> Fic title is from "Reptilia" by Andrew Combs, the unofficial anthem of this fic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the absolutely amazing cover art for this story was made by Eddy! you can find the rebloggable post [here](https://sailershanty.tumblr.com/post/185757777887/art-for-zenelly-on-ao3-for-her-hxhbb19-fic-which)

>  

The acrid taste of smoke rides along the back of his tongue like a familiar friend and Leorio breathes through it, wondering what it is about these sorts of high class people that makes them all want to replace their lack of personalities with vices. Like all the smoke, booze, and needlessly wasteful food make them interesting instead of emptier than ever. Genuine enjoyment must be a flaw reserved for the common classes, he muses as he lets his eyes roam over the room. 

“Careful there, sweet talker,” Zepile murmurs, a raspy voice in his communicator. Leorio turns his attention away from the crowd, biting back a grin. He hadn’t realized that he was talking under his breath, but it doesn’t particularly surprise him. He’s gotten used to narrating what he’s feeling, a habit meant to keep Zepile more in the loop than anything else. “You’re gonna shock the patronage if you keep talking like that.”

“I’m just trying to keep you abreast of the situation.” Like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth. Leorio scowls down at the table spread in front of him before picking up a few small items that probably cost way too much for how ridiculously tiny they are. Rich people, swear to god. “You need full eyes on the ground, y’know.”

“That’s what the security cameras are for, you dingus.”

“Security cameras miss out on all of my color commentary! I’m painting you a picture.”

“If the picture is you scaring away your target because you look deranged, sure.”

Leorio snorts. “If anyone asks, I’ll tell them it was a business call. Bluetooth is all the rage these days.”

He turns to view the room, snagging a glass of something sparkling and probably foul tasting from a passing waiter, and it’s only long, long training that keeps the delicate glass in his hand when Zepile sighs and says, “Pietro would smack you for how bad of a lie that is.”

A blink.

The room falls away around him, all the milling people in their glittering gowns and pitch black tuxedos disappearing as Leorio struggles to breathe through the phantom touch of a hand against his lower back, the cut of a wry grin. He keeps a smile on his face, pinned up at the corners. Force of long habit at this point, even as grief twists the knife still embedded in his lungs.

Voice rough, Leorio says, “Bad timing.”

Zepile is quiet for a few moments. Leorio's heart skips a beat, two, comes back hitting harder than before, loud. Then, “Leorio, maybe it's time you got someone else to cover your back. I’m not telling you to move past what happened with Pietro because I know that’s not how it works, but you might want to consider letting yourself have another partner. Just because he-“

“It was my fault, Zep. I can’t. Not again.”

A staticky sigh in Leorio’s ear, and Zepile audibly lets the subject drop. “Alright, alright. Hey, keep your eyes forward. Subject at three o’clock.”

Leorio straightens, lifts his glass to his mouth. “I see her.”

Engaging in small talk is the work of a moment as Leorio sidles up to Miss Chattal, heir to her rich daddy’s empire, hopefully unknowing of the secrets that eat it alive underneath. She’s gorgeous in a deep blue gown that falls away from achingly perfect shoulders and breasts. Leorio politely keeps his eyes up, impolitely notices anyway as he chats her up.

In a moment, he’ll lift her bracelet, the key on its latch more important than anything else he’s after tonight because there _is_ nothing else if he can’t get this.

(Stupid biometric locks. Leorio longs for the days of even five years ago, when his quick fingers were more than enough to get him into plenty of trouble.)

Something catches his attention across the party hall.

There’s a flash of silver hair, visible for just a moment as a figure slips into a darkened hallway.

Leorio turns his head for just a moment, curious, something _tugging_ right there at the corner of his memory, but then his target smiles, slow and wide, and he returns his attention to the deep red bow of her mouth. Focus, focus. He can find pretty faces in the crowd _after_ he gets the data he needs. It won’t do to just run off, after all. Too suspicious. A little mingling with some pretty folks, some harmless flirting, and then Leorio can be on his way.

Still, something about that person, slight and silver haired, seemed familiar.

Eh, he’ll remember later.

It’s the work of a kiss and a moment to swap the CEO’s daughter’s bracelet with a carefully made replica, and another few minutes work to extract himself.

“Nicely done, Boar,” Zepile says admiringly. “Now hustle. Guard rotation is coming up.”

Guard rotation or no, Leorio slips through the crowd and to a door with a little security reader on it. A quick pass of the bracelet is all he needs for the lock's red light to flicker green and he's in. Nice. Dumb of them to host a party in the lobby of their business building, but Leorio doesn't need them to be smart. It's better for him when they aren't.

Then, just as he turns the corner into a secluded corridor, the alarm goes off.

Leorio swears under his breath. Breaking into a light jog, he hurries down the hallway. “Zep, what the fuck?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t see anything on your end. No one should have seen you at all from where you were.” Distinct clacks of typing, and then Zepile hisses. “Fuck. To your right-“

“Up or-?”

“Down!”

Leorio drops into a full crouch in the nick of time. A kick narrowly sweeps above his head, and Leorio rushes forward without hesitation. The black-clothed person in front of him sidesteps, tries to trip him, dropping a length of chain from one of their hands and-

Chain?

Reaching out, Leorio snags the metal rings before they can be used against him, a terrible suspicion rising in his mind. Sure, the person he’s fighting has long silver hair, but he’s no stranger to disguises. Leorio knocks their cap off, staring hard. And yeah. Beneath the sunglasses and the different haircut, there’s an unfairly pretty face and a full mouth set in a scowl.

“What the _fuck_ ,” Leorio says with feeling.

“Oh god,” says the silver haired asshole in a regrettably familiar voice. “It’s you. Of course it was you. I should’ve known from all the mess you made outside.”

Fuck.

Kurapika glares back at him, his grey eyes stark now that Leorio can see them past his bangs. God, okay, so he should have paid a little more attention to that internal alarm bell that had gone off the moment he caught sight of Kurapika, because then he wouldn’t have to deal with the shortest, most irate member of the Hunters, and one of the only people in the whole organization that Leorio wholeheartedly cannot _fucking stand_.

“Mess _I_ made? Well, _excuse_ me, little cheese chaser, for having to accelerate my _very good plans_ because _someone_ decided to be an aggressive asshole. Why are you even here?”

“Some of us,” Kurapika says with a grunt, spinning to flick a jab at Leorio’s throat, because of _course_ it’s Kurapika, the universe _lives_ to torment Leorio specifically, “have work to do. And it’s Rat, on the job.”

Leorio grabs his wrist tightly enough that Leorio feels the bones grind. “Hey, you’re not the only one here on a job, you know.”

“Job? Are you pretending to be professional? That’s a first, little piggy. Maybe you should go back to stealth training again,” Kurapika sniffs. “Do you think anyone is left who’s unaware of your presence, or did you want to break down the wall like you did on the last mission you bungled? Someone might have missed the excitement the first time.”

“Real funny. But it wasn’t me who got spotted first. Did you leave a body in the linens cabinet again?”

Kurapika snorts. “That was once.”

For a moment, the tableau holds. Leorio can feel the bird-quick thrum of Kurapika’s heart against his fingertips. Kurapika squints at Leorio. “On three?”

“On three.”

“One.”

“Two.”

“Three.”

“Blankovich-“ “-Hirosegawa.”

“Son of a _bitch_.” Leorio lets Kurapika go, scowling. “This is why our handlers need to talk more.”

“Nothing is stopping Melody from talking to Zepplin aside from his own awful personality. You should work with better people.”

“Hey, I like him.”

“Of course you do. The entire tech department has bets out on the two of you being separated at birth, you know?”

“I know.” Leorio snorts. “Being related to Zepps would actually be pretty neat, y’know.”

“Your attitude already assures that you’re only one step removed from a monkey, Leorio. No need to hasten the comparison.”

“So if you didn’t get caught-“

“And I didn’t-“

“-and _I_ didn’t get caught,” Leorio continues, overriding Kurapika’s snide comments because he _is_ the bigger, more mature person here in every way that counts, thank you very much, “then why the fuck is the alarm going off?”

“Because someone _else_ must have been caught. Surely you’re not so clueless as to think-“

“Loathe as I am to interrupt your bickering, newlyweds,” Zepile chimes in with a crackle in Leorio’s ear. From the way Kurapika goes still, eyes slightly distant, he knows Kurapika can hear him too. “But you do still have a mission to complete. Work together, or at least don’t actively get in each other’s way. I’m coordinating with Melody now.”

“Roger that.”

Leorio manages to resist the urge to stick his tongue out at Kurapika’s less-than-enthusiastic tone, instead cooing, “Hello Melody, nice to have you on the line.”

Senritsu laughs, and Leorio’s smile eases into something more relaxed at the sound. “Hello, Four-Oh-Three. It’s good to have you here too.”

“Less chatter, more work. The missing link between monkeys and man here doesn’t need to make any more noise. Melody, status?”

“Your target is on the move on the floor above you, Four-Oh-Four.”

“Same floor as yours, Leo, but yours is stationary. Double Death here should be able to give you a fair amount of cover while you extract your target.” There’s the hiss of carbonation in his ear as Zepile snaps open a can, and Leorio meets Kurapika’s steady, irate gaze as Zepile and Melody murmur together, plotting out their best route. Hopefully one that has them interacting as little as possible. He can’t quite resist the urge to make a face at Kurapika, all the sustained eye contact aggravating.

He absolutely deserves the sneer he gets for it.

The gun cocking is a little extra.

“Alright, move out. Staircase up the hallway to your right. Boar, you’re going under Rat’s cover, since his target is bound to make more noise than yours. Rat, you alright with being a bit more obvious than normal?”

Kurapika huffs, but doesn’t object otherwise when he starts climbing the stairs. “Client said to make a show of it. Just get me out alright, and I’ll be fine.”

Melody’s voice is as soothing as ever as Kurapika eases open the door onto the landing, Leorio standing over him to give him cover. “I have an escape plan for you already. You’ll be alright. Now. To your right is Boar’s objective. Rat, you’ll need to go further into the offices. Your target hasn’t left his desk yet.”

Thank god. Barely more than a few minutes together. Leorio lets out a long breath, resettling his suit jacket before he nods at Kurapika and peels off to the right.

(If he flips Kurapika the bird as he goes, well, he gets the same gesture in response and neither of them mention it to their handlers, so it’s all good.

Zepile sighs a little in his ear, but Leorio chooses to believe that it's cooincidental.)

Leorio navigates swiftly through uniform cubicles, ignoring most of the desks in search of one office. In the dark, it’s a little more difficult than usual, but muscle memory leads Leorio to the right one, and he drops into the office chair with a dramatic flair. The last few weeks of surveillance have paid off handsomely in the form of a username and password that he types in. Leorio swiftly navigates to the folders he’s after.

“Sorry, uh, Nicholas,” he mutters, looking at the computer user's name. “Your services are most appreciated, especially when you end up taking the fall for this.”

Zepile chimes in. “Finding it all where you said it’d be?”

“Yep. They haven’t moved it or bugged it from the looks of things. Not even an attempt at keeping it all on a proprietary program or anything either. Just Sicromoft.”

Zepile and Senritsu share a commiserating grumble at the relative incompetence of corporations keeping nothing secret and secure before a sharp voice cuts them off.

“Some of us,” Kurapika grinds out, “are trying to focus, Pig.”

“Do your job as well as I’m doing mine, sweetheart, and I’ll consider listening to you,” Leorio says sweetly.

And then a startled inhale over his comm. Leorio twitches reflexively, settles his heartbeat out. “Zeps, what the fuck?”

“Boar, you need to get back to Rat. Right now.”

“On it.” Leorio lets the last of the files download, then pulls out the flash and quickly retraces his steps, heart pounding, hand itching for his gun.

Why does nothing Kurapika is involved in ever go according to plan?

 

* * *

 

The scene Leorio finds at the end of the offices is one of pure brutality and complex showmanship. Blood coats more surfaces than it doesn’t, arching in sprays that leave more blood than seems conceptually possible in swathes around the room. A body is pinned by its hands to the desk, and the entirety of its abdominal cavity has been…

Well, excavated, for lack of a better word.

It looks like the bloody aftermath of an autopsy conducted while the subject was alive, all the organs removed and skin peeled and pinned back to expose the flesh beneath. The corpse’s face is caught in a rictus of terror, made worse by the crown of blood and the holes where their eyes used to be.

And over it all is Kurapika. He leans over the desk with a look of concentration on his pretty face, and Leorio has to marvel that there’s not a speck of blood visible on him. He double-taps the comm to give a heads-up about his presence. Kurapika flicks his eyes up, acknowledging him with eye contact before he sighs and straightens out. “He’s been dead for at least an hour.”

“That’s cutting it close. Weren’t you supposed to-“

“I was supposed to get information out of him first.” Something catches Kurapika’s attention and his full mouth presses into a thin line. “But it seems like they got here first.”

“They?” Leorio asks, but his question goes unanswered as Kurapika pulls a piece of paper out from beneath the body.

Kurapika scans the paper quickly as Leorio shrugs and starts picking his way across the room. Geez, he already feels bad for whoever has to clean this carpet. There’s no hope left for saving the carpet, but it’s soaked in the worst way, sticky and wet, and Leorio already bemoans having to get the blood off his shoes.

The note smacks Leorio in the chest, and he sneaks a quick peek at Kurapika’s pinched, furious face before reading the sparse lines. In a neat, fine block script, the note reads:

 

> _“A fair attempt at outpacing me, angel. Unfortunately for you, a little amateur. Try harder next time we meet, please. I would hate to grow bored of one so radiant as you.”_

And then, immediately beneath, just _“:0)”_

Oof. That seems. Pointed, to say the least, and when Leorio checks Kurapika again, he’s unsurprised to find Kurapika furious. “So, I’m guessing you’re the angel in this case. And the note from Mr. Smiley here is from…?”

“The Phantom Troupe,” Kurapika growls. “This man had information on their dealings. I suppose they decided to clear up any loose ends.”

They both look down at the body, and Kurapika’s mouth is uncommonly tense, his fists white-knuckled, a stark contrast to the thin trail of blood dripping down each finger. Leorio frowns, reaches out. “Hey, are you-“

“Don’t _touch_ me,” Kurapika snaps, knocking his hand away. Leorio catches the bloody half-moons dug into Kurapika’s palm and subsides with a scowl. “I’m _fine_.”

“Clearly.”

“Besides, we have bigger things on our plate.”

And Leorio looks back at the body on the desk and lets out a long sigh, dragging a hand through his hair. “Let’s-“

" _Agents_ ," Melody says urgently, but not before they hear a clatter outside and the door to the office slams open. 

“Freeze! Put your hands up!”

Guards.

Damn it.

Did anyone ever actually expect yelling “Freeze” to work? Really?

“Now now,” Leorio starts, lifting his hands up, but a gunshot cuts him off.

Kurapika, steel-eyed and feet braced shoulder-width apart, shoots another guard in the doorway before dodging the return fire.

Well, there goes the chance for de-escalation. Fighting their way out it is.

Swearing under his breath, Leorio lunges for the nearest exit, swiping a lamp from the desk and hurling it at the incoming guard. Kurapika is a blur at his side, taking cover behind the desk. Kurapika’s eyes dart around the room and then, with two quick shots, he fractures the window. Hurling the blood-soaked desk chair into it, the window shatters the rest of the way as Kurapika vaults through it, uncaring of how high up they are or how many shots ring out beside them.

“You crazy mother-“ but Leorio can’t be any less crazy, because he’s jumping out too, fingers scrabbling at the cuff of his suit. A quick press and gloves form fit over his hands, sticking to the slick outer surface of the building and slowing his descent. He glances down, spotting Kurapika nimbly climbing around the building, heading for a corner. He swings out, in, heels impacting the glass with another shatter, and disappears into the building.

God, Leorio _hates_ working with this guy.

“Boar, you alright?”

“Yeah, Zep. We’re heading for the extraction point now. You’d better have someone ready for us because this is some _shit_ we’re in right now.”

“On it. Fellow Hunters will be there.”

Leorio grunts as he scales the building too, following in Kurapika’s trail. “Good. Have them on standby. I’m gonna probably set off an alarm to clear everyone out.”

“Good plan, but you should do it quick. Rat seems to have… a different idea.”

Fuck.

Leorio sees what Zepile meant when he comes across an impromptu shootout in progress, Kurapika, cold-eyed, picking off any guard foolish enough to stick their head out of cover. He barely spares a look for Leorio as Leorio slides in beside him.

“Slow,” Kurapika says.

“Fuck off. Couldn’t you think of any other way to get through this without killing people?”

“Would’ve dragged the-“ Kurapika grunts, shifts his aim, and the sharp rap of gunfire sounds for a second before Kurapika continues speaking. “-whole process out too long. This is more efficient.”

Leorio snorts, fishing a pen out of his pocket. “Gimme a sec and I’ll show _you_ efficiency.”

“I’ve got this, you know.” Kurapika takes a few quick shots. He ducks down long enough to reload and then takes position again. “Are you almost ready?”

“Hold your fucking horses, Mousey, some of us are precision workers,” Leorio says, disassembling his fountain pen. Nifty little thing, when the threads aren’t binding and Leorio can actually get the damn thing _open_ to decant the liquid inside and- Oh, there it goes. Perfect. Pulling out a syringe, he holds the cap in his mouth and talks around it as he injects the fountain pen with part two of this lovely little compound. “If this had just been me, three months of surveillance wouldn’t have just gone down the drain for _nothing_.”

Kurapika cuts him an unimpressed glance. “Did you get your data?”

“Wh- Yes, but-“

“Then it wasn’t a waste, was it? Are you _ready?_ ”

Leorio grumbles and spits the cap out of his mouth. Capping the fountain pen, he shakes it like he used to shake cans of spray paint back when he was a scraped up little kid. Leorio eyeballs the distance between him and the opponents. One, two, _three-_

A metallic _cling_ as the pen hits the floor-

-and a soft rush of noise as the gas spreads out instantly, a large white cloud. The fire alarms go off in the presence of smoke, and Leorio directs Kurapika towards a side door in the confusion. The sedative in the gas will be enough to make anyone who breathes it disoriented and wobbly at best, giving Kurapika and Leorio plenty of time to slip in with now-evacuating guests and blend with the crowd.

They're almost out of the building. Just a few feet more and-

Someone grabs Leorio's shoulder.

“Move along now,” Morel says, giving Leorio a gentle push in the right direction, and Leorio lets out a breath. Damn, couldn’t have just given him a head’s up or something over the comms! Had to give him a heart attack instead.

Still, it’s good to see a friendly face.

Morel gives him a quick two-fingered salute that Leorio returns. Morel directs pedestrian traffic along, palming the pistols Leorio slips him because it won’t be strange for a security guard to have them. Shoot and Knuckle mix in too, directing aid and clearing a path for Kurapika and Leorio to slip out, wide-eyed and gawking every once in a while to sell the whole “fleeing socialite” look. Can’t leave _too_ quickly, Leorio thinks with humor. That’s just as noticeable as lingering too long.

Soon enough, though, the press of the crowd is behind them, and Leorio steps into the relative silence of an abandoned back alley with Kurapika right at his heels.

Kurapika pulls off his wig with a sigh, shaking it out as he levels Leorio a distinctly unimpressed look. His blond hair is sweaty, sticking awkwardly to his scalp until he scrubs his fingers through it. He has a smudge of blood over his cheekbone like the world’s most unsettling highlight, and Leorio almost reaches out to wipe it away when Kurapika does what he always does and ruins things by opening his mouth.

“You are, as always, just a disaster to work with, aren’t you?”

 _Son of a bitch,_ Leorio thinks, startled and angry with it. “Me, a disaster? Who shot out a couple of windows, huh? Who’s the one who-“

“Leorio,” Zepile interrupts before Leorio can get more than a couple of steps closer to this little prick. “Your car is here. Come on, let’s get you back to debrief.”

It would be so easy not to listen and to punch Kurapika right in his smug little condescending face. He’d look even prettier with a busted lip, Leorio figures. For a moment, he swears that Kurapika tilts his head a little, offering Leorio the smooth plane of his cheek, that bright streak of red a challenge. Flexing his hands, Leorio breathes out. Steps back. Then again, waving this whole situation off. “Fine. Alright. Thanks, Zep.”

“Anytime.”

Kurapika regards him for a moment, then snorts. “Figures.”

Two cars are lingering at the mouth of the alley, inconspicuous and possibly the most car-brand car Leorio’s ever seen. They say nothing more to each other as they leave. Kurapika’s door is closed before Leorio even gets his open.

Leorio folds himself into the back seat of the car, watching the other black vehicle speed away, and the glimmer of golden hair in the back window is enough to have Leorio scowling as he slumps down, legs behind the driver’s side seat even when the rest of him is on the passenger side. He flips off the car’s dust trail. It doesn’t make him feel significantly better, but it’s at least a little satisfying.

“Asshole,” Leorio grunts. “Alright, Zeps. Take me home.”


	2. dragonfly out in the sun

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title for this one from "Feeling Good" by Michael Buble, who wins the award for strangest but most enjoyable cover of a muse song i've heard in a complete styleshift
> 
> Art in this chapter is by the incomparable zmeess and can be [reblogged here](https://marinovannyeogurchiki.tumblr.com/post/185773640811/kurapika-freezes-in-the-middle-of-opening-his)

Leorio cracks his neck as he leaves his mercifully quick debriefing and heads through Headquarters’ corporate trappings to the lounge on the third floor. Closest to the accounting department, it has the best coffee machine by far. No one wants under-caffeinated bean counters, after all. That and the vending machine that has something remarkably approaching real food.

Sleep pulls hard at the corners of his eyes. It’s all Leorio can do to fend it off, plowing through the weight of exhaustion like the reality of jetlag is something he can overcome by force of will alone. Just a few more hours. Then he can rest.

Until then: coffee.

As he waits for his coffee to cool to a drinkable temperature, Leorio fishes change from his pocket and thumbs through the silver coins. One-twenty, two-fifty, and three dollars, he counts down feeding them to the machine and retrieves his package of hard-boiled eggs with a groan at his aching legs. The eggs will do for a snack until he can get home and try to make himself something else.

Leorio pops one into his mouth and heads over to the schedule pinned on the wall. It takes a bit of peering, tracing thin black lines from one end of the calendar to the next, but sure enough, both he and Kurapika were scheduled as “away” this weekend. Must have happened when Leorio was already out casing the joint for entry and exit points, otherwise he wouldn’t have been surprised when that little bastard dropped in on him.

He scowls when he notices that Kurapika is already supposed to be back out next week. _“On-site_.” Must be back to his cover job with the mafia.

Damn, but Kurapika really does like to live up to his call-sign.

His mouth twists. Swallowing , he pulls a pen out of his suit pocket. And, because he has no sense of self-preservation, even with how tired he is, Leorio marks himself down as “on-call.”

A cough comes from behind him.

“Director Cheadle!” Leorio scuttles back before he can run into her, knocking his leg into one of the sturdy lunchroom tables. Damn things must be engineered with the sharpest corners possible, just for situations like this. Leorio breathes steadily through his nose. “Hi there. Director. Uh. Sorry about that. Hard at work this week?”

“Unfortunately. Speaking of work,” and Cheadle’s mouth thins, her gaze flicking to the schedule. Leorio takes a half-step to the right to cover it, but not nearly quickly enough. “I thought you would have taken time off this weekend.”

“International crime syndicates and people out to exploit the unprotected don’t wait for holidays and weekends,” Leorio jokes. Well, okay, he “jokes”. It’s the truth, after all, and they all know it. “I know there are plenty of people here to help handle it, but an extra pair of hands is never bad, right?”

She hums then turns away, dismissing him. “Alright, but you’re taking tomorrow off. I won’t have you collapsing on me.”

“On-call,” Leorio bargains. “You don’t have another doctor available until the third, and someone might need patching up.”

Cheadle’s nose wrinkles as she looks over her shoulder. “Most people don’t try to wheedle more time working out of me. Whoever taught you how to haggle must be very proud of themselves. Fine. On-call tomorrow, but only if there’s no one else available. Good job out there today. Now go home and get some rest, Leorio.”

Jauntily, he salutes and takes a bite out of his other egg, pleased. “Yes, ma’am.”

 

* * *

 

Twelve, glorious, sleep-filled hours later, the chirping of Leorio’s phone rouses him. He slaps his hand out, finding pillow, pillow, sheet, his own nose and his scratchy stubble beneath, and then finally the smooth surface of his phone screen. Squinting, Leorio fumbles around until he manages to swipe the green circle up and presses the phone to his cheek. “Whassit.”

“Leorio, you’re being called in.”

“Tell them to call someone else,” Leorio grumbles, face down in his own drool spot. He rubs his face against his pillow, debating turning it over to the other side and giving up on the phone call entirely as Zepile keeps talking.

“Hey, you’re the one who said to put you on call. Besides, this is a direct order from the Director.”

That gets his attention. Leorio sits up, pulls the world into focus around him as he tries to bring his admittedly foggy mind to bear. “From Cheadle herself? Really?”

“It’s Director Cheadle to you, and she won’t let you forget it. Get in here, Leorio. And _fast_. Whatever is going on is big. You’re not the only one getting called in,” Zepile continues, filling Leorio in as Leorio stumbles around his shitty little apartment for his clean pair of slacks. “There are at least four other agents also getting called.”

“Same project?”

“I’m not sure. I think …” And Zepile hums, trailing off.

Leorio loops a belt through his loops, tightening it around his hips before casting around for a tie. Red? No, no red. Green maybe? It’ll offset his eyes, and Cheadle tends to be partial to the color. “You think?”

“I think they’re here to take over your mission. But this is speculation, mind you.”

“Don’t sell yourself short, Zeps,” Leorio says fondly. “You are, without a doubt, one of the most gossipy people I know. If anyone was going to know the truth behind the speculation, it’d be you.”

There’s a prim little sniff that doesn’t quite disguise the grin Zepile is audibly wearing. “Well, I _think_ there was a compliment in there somewhere, clearly a sign of your skills in flattery, so _thank you_ , Leorio. Don’t break any laws getting over here.”

“I’d never be caught unless you started sucking at your job,” Leorio sing-songs, and hangs up on Zepile laughing.

 

* * *

 

The particular tang of early morning air coats Leorio’s lungs as he makes his way to the bland, utilitarian building that is the Hunter Association Headquarters. Dawn is more of a pale pink suggestion in the sky than anything else by the time he slips through the doors, and he tosses the receptionist, Fumi, a quick hello. Zepile is nowhere to be seen. Probably down in the labs, Leorio figures, stifling a yawn while he gets on the elevator.

Whatever this is, let it either be interesting, or be over soon.

“Good morning, Madam Director,” Leorio says as he enters her office, and Cheadle looks up from the pile of paperwork on her desk with a faint, if distant smile, pushing her glasses up her nose.

“Good morning, Leorio. Thank you for coming in so shortly after your last mission.”

He spreads his hands wide. “I did ask to come in this weekend. I’m a little surprised you actually called though. Thought you were insistent on giving me more rest.”

“You’ve been languishing away from field work, Four-oh-three,” Cheadle says, and Leorio shrugs.

“You won’t send me out without a partner usually, so.”

“Our line of work is dangerous enough. Partners-“

“I don’t need the spiel, Director. I’m not arguing with you to try and get you to send me out without someone assigned to me. It’s just that I usually can’t handle that, so don’t like… make it sound like it’s a choice I’m making.”

“Oh, Leorio! Good morning to you. And a good morning to you as well, Madam Director,” a new voice sounds, calm and even.

“Senritsu!” Leorio says, excited. Then, the rest of his brain catches up to him because if Senritsu, one of the best techs and a dedicated support agent, is here, then her partner has to be too. They’re never apart because  _someone_  refuses to work with anyone unless Senritsu is the one in his ear because  _someone_ is a picky, prickly bastard who can’t play well with others, and Leorio’s hackles are already up. He whirls on his heel, looking at Cheadle pleadingly. “Aw no, boss, come on, please not-“

“You’re working with Agent Four-oh-four,” Cheadle says. Her tone invites absolutely no discussion and even less whining. Negative whining. So little whining it turns around on itself and is instead enthusiastic effusive praise.

Leorio straightens up with a sigh and a bite to his inner cheek. He can behave. He can be professional.

“Are you fucking serious?” he hisses not a moment later. “That guy hates me! And he’s got a death wish a mile wide.”

Cheadle sighs. “Then you’ll have to rein him in, won’t you? Leorio, this is important. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t.” Then, wryly, “The entire Agency is, after all, very aware of how you feel about him.”

Snorting, Leorio crosses his arms. “Yeah, because he’s a  _dick_.”

“Professional as always, I see, Piggy,” a cool voice comes from behind Leorio’s left elbow.

Leorio would like a raise for  _not_  immediately elbowing him in the throat, turning to level the intruder with a solid glare. “Oh get fucked, jackass. That’s not even my call sign.”

Predictably, Kurapika barely even looks ruffled. Hell, he doesn’t even bother seeming unimpressed, adjusting his cuffs on his suit, and Leorio bristles as Kurapika nods a greeting to Cheadle, ignoring him completely. “I can’t stay too long. The Nostrades will start getting nervous about my absence. You had better make this good, Director.”

“Agent, it wouldn’t matter if it was good or not. If I have something for you, you would be going anyway.”

This bring him up short, and Leorio snorts, grimly pleased.

Cheadle examines him for a moment before she nods. Letting out a sharp breath of air, her lips thin as she slides a pair of folders across her desk. “Luckily, however, there is something that I think will be of particular interest to you in here, and that’s why I’ve called you in.”

Kurapika freezes in the middle of opening his folder. His eyes are transfixed by the picture clipped into the file, and Leorio frowns, opening up his own folder to see a group of people, ragtag and assorted, each of their faces familiar, but especially the man in the center’s. Turned in profile, his eye unerringly catches the camera lens. Deep blue. Utterly calm. Remarkable, really, considering the massacre that surrounds them.

But then again, Leorio muses, shooting Kurapika another look, Chrollo Lucilifer has never been anything short of unhinged.

“The Phantom Troupe has surfaced again,” Cheadle announces. Perhaps a bit unnecessarily, given how tightly Kurapika grips the folder. “We’d like you two to go after them.”

“I can go alone.”

“No, Kurapika. You don’t know what lead we have. There’s an informant we have placed among them, and given your track record with the Troupe, you won’t be able to get close enough to get the information from them without raising suspicion. You’ve been on their radar far too much for that.”

Kurapika’s lips pull back in a snarl. “You let me work alone or I walk.”

Leorio bristles, but Cheadle cuts him off before he can even make a sound. “No. You partner with Leorio or you don’t go at all. Those are our conditions. No partner, no information.”

There’s a moment, just an instant, where Kurapika’s eyes flick to Leorio and he feels it like a laser sight aiming for his vitals, the crawling sensation that makes him want to get behind cover. In that moment, Leorio honestly thinks he’s going to keep being the stubborn asshole he’s known for being, but when Kurapika relaxes, his hands clenched tightly into fists, Leorio supposes that the rumors must be true.

Kurapika really will do anything to get closer to the Phantom Troupe.

“Fine,” Kurapika grits out. “Fine. But he’d better not get in my way.”

“I won’t get in your way, _sweetheart_.” Get in his way? Hah. Leorio’d love to see someone as prickly as Kurapika get as much information out of someone as Leorio at his most charming. Kurapika’s more likely to shoot first and ask questions later, where Leorio prefers a subtler, more humanitarian approach.

The flat look he gets for that sends a shiver down Leorio’s spine.

There’s no way either of them can work like this, so even though Leorio hates it, he swallows his pride as best he can. Trust is imperative for two agents to work together. Leorio won’t get any work done if he’s worried about Kurapika’s crosshairs between his shoulder blades. So with a sigh and a scrub of his hand up his face and through his hair, rasping against his stubble, Leorio says, “Look, alright, we’re working together from now, right, partner?”

Kurapika stares at the hand Leorio offers the way someone would stare at a cockroach. Then, he ignores it completely, looking over at Director Cheadle. “Is that all?”

“Yes, Kurapika. That’s all.”

“Asshole,” Leorio mutters, brushing his hand off on his suit. Oh well. A quick, information gathering mission, and then they’ll just be on their way. It’ll be fine. One way or another, Leorio won’t have to deal with Kurapika’s attitude for too long. He can ignore a little itch against his spine.

Kurapika knocks his shoulder into Leorio’s bicep while they pass, eyebrows firmly set in a glare. Cheap! Fucking cheap, and hilarious for how it’s not even shoulder-to-shoulder contact the way it should be, but a swirl of rage overtakes Leorio in an instant. Stupid, cheap, and regrettably effective. Leorio lunges, ready to fucking _deck_ that little asshole, but Cheadle stays his hand, her grip like iron around his wrist.

The door shuts peacefully behind Kurapika.

With a sigh, Cheadle releases Leorio and cocks an eyebrow at him. “I don’t have time to bench you for fighting another agent again. Keep your temper and your hands to yourself.”

Leorio’s mouth thins. “You know he has his own agenda.”

“That’s why I have you going in on this mission too, Leorio,” Cheadle says, patting him on the arm. “You’re to keep an eye on him and keep him on track as much as possible, alright? If something happens that’s about to jeopardize the mission, I’m counting on you to stop him.”

“Yes ma’am,” Leorio says instead of “ _are you crazy_ ” because the Director has clearly made up her mind. No amount of arguing will change that, no matter the fact that Kurapika hates him and always has. The feeling is, at least, thankfully mutual.

Leorio doesn’t see it changing anytime soon.

 

* * *

 

“Hey old man! You finally made it in,” Killua shouts as the elevator’s doors open onto the laboratory floor with a quiet ding. It’s reflex at this point for Leorio to flip him off. The lab is quiet at this hour. Killua’s grin cuts across his pretty, still-boyish face, mostly grown out of his adolescent baby fat, and he wags a finger. “Naughty. Here I am, hyping you up for your soon-to-be-successful mission, and this is the thanks I get?”

Leorio steps over a small pile of mismatched parts, falling like a waterfall out of a nearby shelf as he makes his way over. Lounging on a sleek, stainless steel table, one of Killua’s legs swings free beneath it. He watches various technicians scurry about, eyes wide and intent on them, and the wide and intent on Leorio. “Maybe do it better, and I’ll pay more attention.”

“Oh, hey, thanks for summarizing my opinions on your missions in general. How are you gonna survive this whole trip without Kurapika reorganizing your insides?”

“Oh god,” Leorio groans. “Look, I don’t need input from the baby squad, okay?”

“Watch your mouth, old man, or the baby squad’s gonna put you down.”

There’s a laugh, as brash and unapologetic as its owner, and Gon says, “Killua, if you don’t want him to keep calling us the baby squad, you should probably stop using it as our group name, y’know.”

Killua tuts, arms crossed over his chest as he stares suspiciously at Leorio, who doesn’t take it personally. Killua tends to look at everything suspiciously except for his teammates, a ball of sunshine disguised as a human being who can still kick most anyone’s ass in close combat, Gon Freeces, and tech savvy witch who has a habit of collecting increasingly strange debts in exchange for favors, Alluka Zoldyck, his baby sister. Gon waves his arm, still in a cast, at Leorio, chipper as ever. He seems to ignore Killua batting his hand down, remarkably gentle despite the speed that’s made him well known for his stealth missions.

“Look, I’m just down here to see Zepile about some new tech okay?”

Gon perks up. “You’re going out again? Are you going with Zepile? Have you rested enough after your last mission? Do you want to spar?”

“Yes, no, god no never, and not while your arm is still broken and you haven’t been given a clean bill of health, you impatient brat,” Leorio rattles off, sliding his bracelet over the ID scan and waiting for it to give its chipper beeps of approval before stepping back, letting the gun rack rattle down in front of him. “Well, how about it, chief? Anything new and fun for me to play with before my partner inevitably shoots me himself?”

There’s silence.

“Partner?” Alluka asks, just as the elevator doors slide open for the second time.

Leorio’s mouth twists to the side. He jerks his chin at Kurapika, exiting onto the laboratory floor like he knows they’ve been talking about him and he doesn’t care. “Speak of the devil.”

“You two are partners?”

“Regrettably. I don’t know why you’re wasting your time in that locker, useless. Aren’t you supposed to be the stealthier one?” Kurapika’s bare feet pad almost silently across the floor and Leorio makes a face down at them just because he can. Bare feet, really? Inside the Agency? Leorio can’t tell if he just doesn’t like shoes or if he has a sincere wish to break his toes on the sharp corners of every desk he passes by. “Just leave the firepower to me.”

“If I have my way about this, I won’t need to rely on you for anything at all.”

Snorting, Kurapika grabs his favorite style of pistol and a handful of ammo refills. Then, after a moment’s consideration, a rifle. Another pistol, smaller. A shotgun. Leorio watches this bemusedly, as Kurapika begins stacking more weaponry on the table. Knives too? “Now that’s a feeling that’s mutual.”

Asshole. Leorio shrugs, too stiff to be as casual as he wants. “We’re just getting information. We’re in, we’re out, that’s all. No trouble at all.”

Kurapika snorts.

Killua claps him on the shoulder. “When you come back after a shootout, old man, I’ll remind you that you have no one except yourself to blame for what happened.”

Leorio scoffs. “It’s information gathering. Not a gunfight.”

“You’re working with Kurapika,” Killua retorts like that’s a whole argument and- y’know, actually, now that Leorio gives more than a half-second’s thought to it, that’s a fair assessment. Kurapika is a known destructive force unto himself.

“Well, if he can keep his chaos to himself for once and be professional-” Leorio starts.

Kurapika whirls on him before he even finishes, but another voice interrupts him.

“Now boys, don’t get too tetchy with each other,” Senritsu says, coming around the corner with a pile of items in her arms. “Right here, Zepile.”

Zepile grunts in assent, dropping the other equipment on the table with a quiet thud. Leorio immediately abandons the gun cabinet in favor of much more _fun_ toys. Among the pile of gadgetry, Zepile starts sorting things into two piles, passing them to Leorio as he goes.

“Here, Leorio. For you, a smoke bomb tie pin. Careful of the cap, it’s a little finicky. And your glasses needed an upgrade, so here those are back too.”

“Those are tech?” Kurapika asks. His voice gives away exactly how unimpressed he is, but Leorio just sniffs and puts them on, feeling better already with them present. A chipper read-out, familiar already, scrolls across his vision, marking temperature and location, a subtle, constant background analysis.

Zepile shrugs. “Of course they are. Leorio, I updated those glasses to see in infrared now, plus your diagnostic vision and recordings. We can probably get ultraviolet too, but we haven’t tested that far ahead yet. And, most importantly, they match with these.”

Two pairs of shoes slide across the table, Leorio gives them a questioning glance, and Zepile grins. He toggles a switch Leorio can’t see, presses a shoe against the mat, removes it and-

Leorio is stunned.

A bright, shining footprint is clearly visible on the table. “Tracking capabilities?”

“What on earth are you talking about?” Kurapika huffs, and that’s when Leorio pops his glasses up, peering at the table without the lenses. Sure enough, the table appears completely unmarked. He whistles lowly, impressed.

“Those glasses,” Zepile says, proud, “have a filter on them that allows you to see the footprint left behind by these two pairs of shoes. You do have to activate the compound secreted by these shoes, but it dries quickly and doesn’t impact friction as far as we can tell. Kurapika, Senritsu said that glasses weren’t really your style, so we made a few different adjustments and came up with these instead.”

Kurapika catches the small compact case when Zepiles slides it across the table. “Contacts?”

“Careful though,” Zepile warns. “The contacts glow red when they’re active, so it’s a dead giveaway that something’s up. Had to make the sacrifice to allow them to work. And last but not least, is this.” He offers up a small jewelry box. On the soft cushion inside is a bright, glimmering earring.

Man, Senritsu was really working on a theme with red here, wasn’t she? The crimson crystal sparkles in the bright lights as Kurapika takes it with careful fingers.

“What is this?”

“An explosive. Last resort, but it’s crazy powerful. Just break the crystal and you’ll have about fifteen seconds before-“ and Zepile mimes an explosion with his hands, making mock-explosion sounds. “So be careful. It’s tough glass, but not unbreakable.”

“If I have to use it at all, then no one is getting out of that situation alive. No one will tell.” Kurapika takes the contact case, turning it over in his hands before stashing it in his coat. He wastes no time in hooking the earring up. Shaking his head, he settles it in place, brushing his hair flat again. “Last measures, correct?”

“Right.”

Senristu levels Kurapika a speaking look. “This is a measure to be avoided at all costs, Kurapika. Don’t use it unless you absolutely have to.”

“I understand,” Kurapika says. Leorio doesn’t know what higher power grants him the strength not to comment on that, toning his disbelief down to a mild snort instead of some acerbic comment, but Kurapika seems to hear everything he doesn’t say regardless, cutting him a sharp glance. “Nothing from you, Four-Oh-Three. Not a word.”

“I didn’t even say anything! See this guy? So sensitive, I swear. Anything fun for me specifically in there, Zeps?”

Kurapika whirls on him, hair fanning out, and Leorio catches the flash of his earring almost more than he catches the look in Kurapika’s eyes. He only barely gets a hand up in time to catch Kurapika’s heel in his hand.

“You are _begging_ for the bitch to get slapped out of you,” Kurapika snarls. Leorio can’t help but be delighted in an adrenaline fueled sort of way by the surprising deviation from his typical faux-politeness. “Do you ever take anything seriously, or is this case going to be just as much of a joke to you as your last one?”

“It’s not- I work _hard_ , Kurapika. If any screw ups happen here, it sure as shit won’t be my fucking fault.”

“What an optimistic outlook for someone who got his last partner _killed_ ,” Kurapika says, and whatever response Leorio could have had to that dries up in his throat.

Distantly, he hears Zepile murmur, “Hey now, Four-Oh-Four, that’s not…”

And like the catch of a spark on tinder, Leorio’s temper flares. The taste of copper on his tongue bleeds through every breath, but no words come to the fore. He shoves Kurapika’s heel back, sending him stumbling backwards before the red haze clears, gripping Kurapika’s collar in a tight fist as Kurapika, unamused, coldly regards him. He draws back-

“Calm _down_ ,” Senritsu snaps.

A beat.

Two.

Three.

(The force that holds him back is as gentle as the haunting of old laughter that is rusted around the corners with nicotine and as devastating as waking up alone has been for the past year, and it’s nothing more than the thin cord Leorio’s been clinging to since he last saw Pietro. Stronger than steel. Stronger than his own heartbeat.)

“We do not have time for either of the two of you to be injured. Leorio, let him go. Kurapika, don’t make weapons out of other people’s hardships.”

Leorio swallows and it tastes like blood. “Yes, ma’am.”

Finger by finger, he releases Kurapika. Bit by bit, he straightens up, and with a flex of his wrists, he tugs his jacket back into place. Out of the corner of his eye, Alluka, Killua, and Gon are all half-out of their seats, ready to intervene if things had managed to go any further. They relax nonchalantly.

None of it restores the atmosphere to the room. Copper still lingers in his mouth.

Senritsu’s eyes are sympathetic as she folds their display sheet back up, fixing each of them with a look. “Your flight out is at oh-six-hundred hours. Get some rest here. The Agency will take you over in the morning, alright?”

Kurapika turns on his heel with the soft scuff of bare feet on tile and, shooting Leorio one last disdainful glance, snatches his practical armory off the table. He leaves, every line of his body snapping with repressed anger. Leorio doesn’t know what _he_ has to be so mad about. Leorio’s the one who got slandered today, after all.

“You’ll do fine, Leorio,” Gon says with a strong clap to Leorio’s shoulder. “Don’t worry.”

“Thanks for the support, kid.” Leorio stares out the door, sliding gently closed with none of the force of Kurapika’s exit, mouth twisted to the side. “Between us, I think I’m gonna need it.”


	3. scarlet billows start to spread

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> His ears ring from the collision with the floor. He has a brief moment of awareness, of the shock-startle of heat and weight across his hips and Kurapika’s hand around the back of his neck, before it’s gone and Kurapika snaps off a shot at the next wave of guards. “Time to keep moving,” Kurapika says in a tight voice. “Come on, Pig. Up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> was this supposed to go up uhhh a month ago? yes  
> did it? clearly not  
> it's about con season so i'm about to be glued to my sewing machine for the next three weeks too. see you guys for the next chapter after that.

Flights are riotous messes of sounds and people. Leorio scowls at the seat back in front of him, knees pressed uncomfortably against the hard plastic as whoever is in front of him bounces repeatedly. He’s gonna be bruised to hell and back at this rate.

“This fucking sucks,” he mutters under his breath.

“You picked the flight and your seat,” Kurapika says dryly, unsympathetic as always, and Leorio spares a moment to scowl further up the cabin, at first class where Kurapika sits. Bet he’s just _cushy_. Bet he feels _great_ and his knees aren’t threatening mutiny or murder, whichever comes first. Bet they wouldn’t even if he was sitting all the way behind the wings of the plane like Leorio is.

Bastard.

“If I’d known that first class was an option, I would’ve gone for it,” Leorio keeps on grumbling, knowing that the fine microphones will pick up and transmit his words clear as day. Whatever snit Kurapika had been in yesterday didn’t seem to carry over at all today, since he greeted Leorio almost civilly for once -if a single disdainful glance and a nod counted as civil. Whatever. Leorio can play nice with the best of them. If civil bickering will be what gets them through this without any more fights, Leorio will swallow his tongue.

“I never knew it wasn’t. Don’t your handlers ever book it for you? Or are you really this masochistic?”

“Ooh, talk about my sexual habits some more, babe, it really gets me going. Besides, some of us like to blend in, and we don’t all have your anger issues keeping us separated from common folk, Kurapika.”

“That’s a shame,” Kurapika says without managing to sound sorry even the slightest bit. “Maybe you should try it, but. I suppose you really don’t need to be any louder than you already are, do you? Besides, what nonsense are you spewing about _blending in_ when you’re a giant? There is no such thing as “blending in” for you.”

“Just because you can’t reach the top of your gun locker on your own doesn’t mean you have to get snippy at my superior height.”

“I’m going to cut you off at the knees and wear your shins as platform shoes.”

Leorio manages to turn his hyena laughter into a coughing fit, earning him a few odd looks but nothing too serious as the plane begins to depart, engines roaring to the sound of an off-put huff in his ear.

 

* * *

 

“What do you _mean_ they lost my luggage?”

Smugly, Kurapika grins. “This is why I never fly coach.”

Fuck he can’t argue with that. Kurapika’s bags, specially loaded with Melody pulling some strings behind the curtain probably so they could avoid any questions about the veritable armory Leorio bets Kurapika brought along, sit innocuously at Kurapika’s feet. Meanwhile, Leorio’s bag is taking a tour of Continental Europe without him, it seems.

“Son of a bitch.” Leorio swears, scrubbing at the back of his neck with his short nails. Not much to do about it aside from hope that the Agency will track it down before he needs it.

At least he still has his briefcase.

Kurapika watches him, amusement visible in the curl of his mouth and the slow dip of his lashes. “Hopeless,” he proclaims. Lightly slapping Leorio’s shoulder, he moves past him. “Come on. No sense waiting around here for it. Hotel first.”

 

* * *

 

Their hotel is plain and sensible and thankfully has two beds so Leorio doesn’t have to get shot over mattress privileges. He can save his one annual allowed gunshot wound for something more important. Kurapika continues the strange new trend of not being a complete asshole too, at least allowed Leorio to rest up and shower briefly before they hit the streets.

The location they’re staking out is a medical supply corporation, sure to be full of plenty of secrets, but full of easily exploitable security holes. Leorio spends a couple of weeks blending in, letting other people grab the door for him until he’s a passably familiar face of someone who probably works there but keeps forgetting his badge. A quick sleight of hand secures a pair of badges for him and Kurapika.

But it’s Kurapika who insists they have to wait. Wait and see.

The Phantom Troupe won’t move without reason. Neither will their contact, it seems.

Leorio stifles a groan as he cracks his neck. He’s well-versed in patience, but this is getting pretty ridiculous. If Kurapika would just let him go in there again and snoop around, he’s sure he can figure out why this building specifically is of such interest to the Phantom Troupe. He gets dressed for the day, shaving with a careful hand. There’s something very relaxing about the rhythm of shaving with a straight razor. At least that much had been in his briefcase, since his suitcase is, last they checked, somewhere in Barcelona.

When he finishes washing his face of remaining lather, Kurapika is right behind him.

Reflexively, Leorio slams him against the wall with the razor against his neck. Kurapika has his arm in a tight grip, keeping the blade from digging deeper, and he regards Leorio with a cool curiosity.

“Jumpy, are we?” Kurapika asks, the hand on Leorio’s wrist pressing down.

Leorio snorts. Then allows his arm to be moved, shifting backwards until there’s space between them again. “Sorry. Habit.”

“Mm, I understand. I hadn’t realized I was moving so quietly,” Kurapika says, and Leorio cedes him the bathroom. A question has him lingering, though, watching the sunrise mingle in Kurapika’s bright burnished hair.

He doesn’t know how to ask it.

He has to try anyway, the words welling out of him.

“You’ve… relaxed, since we got here.”

It’s weird, Leorio knows better than to say, but the quirk of Kurapika’s mouth implies that he hears it anyway. “Is it bad of me to try and be civil with my partner?”

“It’s just not something you’re known for,” Leorio says. Swallows. “Especially not with me.”

Kurapika hums. “Let’s just say… that I’ve thought some things over and come to a different conclusion than usual.”

“Oh really?”

Kurapika’s gaze drops very deliberately to Leorio’s mouth and takes its time making its way back to his eyes, something considering and liquid hot in their grey depths. Leorio breathes through his swift reflexive curl of want, his body responding the way it always does to another person’s visible come-ons, stops the way he wants to tilt his head in mirrored response. It would be easy. Kurapika is making it easy at this moment, angled close. Another step and he’d have one leg between Leorio’s with no problem.

Despite all of this, despite the itch under his skin that urges Leorio to reach out and touch, he doesn’t.

There must be something in his expression that gives him away because Kurapika frowns and retreats before Leorio says anything. “Interesting,’ he says blandly, as though whatever realization he just had was anything but. “I thought you would go for that.”

Leorio snorts. Shifting his weight, he leans a little harder against the wall behind him and tries not to give away how close he had been to giving Kurapika what he wanted. “Hardly. I like to trust people before I sleep with them.”

“Are you saying you don’t trust me?” Kurapika’s lips quirk in a smile. “Partner, I’m hurt.”`

“I don’t think you really care. Now, are we here to do our job, or are we playing verbal footsies all night?”

 

* * *

 

That strange electric tension doesn’t appear again, and Kurapika seems to have completely brushed it off by the time they get to the rooftop of a building they’ve taken over as their own. It’s good he has, because Leorio is still twitching at every sharp motion and brush of contact, anticipatory and distracted, and it isn’t until Kurapika literally growls at him that he drops it. Focus. He has to focus. Kurapika is attractive, but Leorio meant it when he said he didn’t sleep around.

Beside him doing surveillance, Kurapika tucks his hair behind his ear, revealing the long line of his throat and the glint of red against his skin.

Leorio muffles a whimper and turns back to setting up their sniper rifle.

And then, he does what he does best: talk.

“Honestly, I still don’t understand why the Troupe is even dipping into this line of work. Seems dumb. And sloppy.”

“And yet they’re still running circles around everyone who’s trying to prevent this.” Kurapika lets out a breath, lowering the binoculars. Leorio doesn’t mention the oddly endearing red mark they’ve left on his nose. “Why do you say it’s sloppy?”

Leorio shrugs. “Them getting into human trafficking is what gives us another way to track them and hunt them down, doesn’t it? That’s why we’re here. We’ve already found a way in.”

To this, Kurapika says nothing.

“And for them, it _is_ really sloppy. Usually, they pull off these big heists and indentify themselves in the minimal evidence they leave behind. Like your murder, when this was all kicked off. This? This is all. Very sloppy.” Leorio stops and frowns, mind clicking away. “Too sloppy, really. Like-“

“A set-up?” Kurapika finishes. He doesn’t even have the dignity to sound surprised, the fucker.

Leorio shifts uncomfortably, checking out the front of the building again. “Well, yeah.”

“That’s because it _is_ a set-up, Leorio. And you’re right, it is a very amateur one. They’re playing with the fact that we know it’s a trap and will go in anyway. It’s not sloppy; it’s a mind game. They know I won’t walk away.”

“You specifically?”

Kurapika’s mouth twists when Leorio shoots him a glance, and he raises the binoculars to obscure Leorio’s view of his expression. “Me, specifically.”

“So it’s a challenge, then.”

“What?”

“You said it yourself. The Phantom Troupe doesn’t need to get involved in things like this. There isn’t enough money in it for them, not like money is a prime motivator to begin with, and it needs to be too underground for the attention they like to bring to themselves. Their MO is large scale crime followed by disappearance. So why this, and why now? And why this? They’re more likely to do an art heist than human trafficking.” Leorio’s brow creases in thought. “Though, realistically speaking, the art must be pretty worthless to them too. I don’t know what they’d use it for.”

Distractedly, Kurapika says, “Chrollo likes to keep it on his walls. Or, when he’s feeling particularly anti-establishment and nihilistic, he’ll burn it.”

Leorio watches him shuffle a few pictures around, organizing them to some system familiar only to Kurapika, a suspicion growing at the back of his head. “For someone so diametrically opposed to them, you seem to know an awful lot of personal information about their boss.”

Kurapika’s hands still. His thumb digs a crease into the glossy surface of one of the pictures. Then, steadily, he replies, “Chrollo enjoys showing off. This sort of information is easily available if you have the right source.”

“Right. Like if the source is the person himself?”

Kurapika is too well-trained to flinch at that, but he takes a moment longer to blink, his expression carefully blank. “I don’t know what you’re trying to suggest here, but you’re not going to find anything useful, Leorio. My loyalty has been tested numerous times, many of them by Director Cheadle herself. Take it up with her.”

“You just seem very… familiar with him.”

At that, Kurapika’s mouth pulls to the side again. “Unfortunately.”

Leorio is about to ask when Kurapika goes still. His entire body focuses to a single point, held entirely still as he stares down at the entrance.

“What is it?” Leorio asks. He pops up to have a look and just catches the closing swing of the front doors.

“Nothing. I just saw a way in, I think.” Kurapika’s full mouth presses flat, thin and pale with tension. Leorio can’t tell at all what he’s thinking, but he’s sure it’s nothing good, and his suspicions are proven correct when Kurapika just nods, proclaims, “I’m going in.”

Leorio catches Kurapika by the elbow. “What, right now?”

“No. But later, I’ll be the one going in.” Kurapika casts one last look at the door, that same curious stillness in his eyes, before ducking and slinking back across the rooftop towards their access point. “Come on, Piggy. You still have to impress me at _some_ point during this venture. Who knows, maybe your aim with a rifle isn’t quite as abysmal as I’ve been led to believe.”

“I’ll shoot _you_ ; see what you think of my shooting _then_ ,” Leorio snaps immediately. He sees nothing unusual about the building when he, too, looks one last time. Just a plain brick building. Unremarkable aside from the number of people who have gone in and haven’t come out again.

Shaking his head, he follows Kurapika. With any luck, they’ll find something out tonight.

 

* * *

 

A storm comes through in the afternoon while Kurapika and Leorio catch a few hours of sleep in between booming thunder and the harsh howl of wind. Leorio takes watch first, staring out at the streets between sheets of rain. Not much to see. Just a whole lot of grey and sharp snaps of purple lightning. So Leorio’s attention drifts inside, to the room’s other occupant.

Kurapika sleeps curled up like a pillbug, hands tucked close to his face and chin, knees to his chest. His breathing is light and easy, a sure sign that he’s about two seconds away from snapping awake at the slightest noise. Not finding a bullet between his eyes is as good a reason as any to keep his hands to himself, and Leorio sighs, turns his attention back to keeping watch, and waits for his turn as the light goes from gold to grey to blue through the clouds. Dark and darker.

Finally, in the strange green-blue of the worst of the storm, Kurapika sits up. As easy as anything, like he wasn’t even asleep two minutes before. He stretches, the long line of his back arching under Leorio’s lingering eyes, then turns to blink placidly at Leorio. Incongruously, he has a red mark across his cheek.

A pillow crease.

“Rest,” Kurapika orders, and Leorio stifles both a laugh and a yawn, stands. The cool sheets are a relief, settling the job-ready static in his skin.

He’s asleep before he even gets his shoes off.

When Leorio wakes, it’s to Kurapika standing over him and staring, the backs of his eyes glinting blue-white. Leorio _doesn’t_ twitch, he _doesn’t_ , and he definitely doesn’t get a little sore doing it, his whole body violently protesting being frightened. Squinting up at Kurapika, Leorio can just make out the hazy blue ring that signifies his contacts. Figures.

“You snore,” Kurapika says.

“Your contacts make your eyes do that cat thing. S’freaky.”

Kurapika lets out an oddly pleased hum at this, then turns on his heel. “Come on. If you’re good, I’ll even let you use my gun.”

“And if I’m bad?” Leorio can’t help but ask, leaning a little too close as he follows after, playful.

Surprisingly, Kurapika doesn’t hit him for his proximity. Just smiles, a few too many teeth bared. “Don’t find out.”

Leorio bites back the fact that now he’s _curious_ , determinedly doesn’t think about _biting_ in detail, and mostly convinces himself he’s successful by the time he’s climbed up the countless flights of stairs to his observation point.

The rooftop is worse wet, Leorio finds, covered in gravel and debris from the storm, the air hot-sweet-sticky with the smell of fallen tree limbs that are strewn here and there across the space. With a shake of his head, he gets set up in a corner, using the branches as natural camouflage. Leorio doubletaps his comm. “Boar checking in, set up and in position.”

Two clicks back. A whisper, “Rat, moving in.”

And then, he waits.

And waits.

God, this side of infiltration is the fucking worst.

“Y’know, I’ve thought about it some more and I’m the one who really should be in there. Spy work isn’t all fancy suits and a license to kill,” Leorio grumbles, and he knows he isn’t imagining the quiet huff of laughter from Kurapika. Squinting down the sight of Kurapika’s sniper rifle, he scans the area again. “If we needed someone to blend in with the locals, I’m pretty damn sure I’d do a better job than you.”

“Oh would you? What gave you that impression, hm?”

Leorio marks the exits, the guards, pulls back to rub at his eyes. “Well, there’s the fact that you’re all of five-foot-two.”

“I am five-foot- _seven_ , Pig. And what these people are looking for is subtle. An intent to cause harm. You are the furthest thing from subtle.”

“I’m plenty fucking subtle.”

There’s a flash of gold by one of the windows, Kurapika moving swiftly through the open area, and Leorio doesn’t let himself get distracted by the release of tension in his chest. Then, a soft exhale, too close, and Leorio curses the sensitivity of these communicators as the sound senses a rush of goosebumps down his body. _Knock that off_ , he thinks sternly. He doesn’t need any distractions, and the heat that lingers like a touch is definitely a one-sided distraction. He still hasn’t quite managed to shake off Kurapika’s earlier closeness, feint though it was.

Hasn’t stopped thinking about the line of his teeth or the fullness of his mouth either.

_Concentrate, Paladiknight_ , he scolds himself and readies the sight again. He’s here for a reason.

Leorio counts the minutes as he monitors the guards. So far, no one is rushing in. No alarms have gone off. This might just be a wild success, even if Leorio _still_ would have found everything just as fast as Kurapika did, no matter what the other agent says.

The guard changes.

Still nothing.

Actually, Leorio realizes, a prickle of unease going down the back of his neck, not even the sound of Kurapika breathing is coming over the ridiculously sensitive communicator. Leorio can’t hear anything aside from himself and the various noises of the street below. They’re getting close to extraction time, too. Leorio taps the comm, making sure it’s on, then swivels the rifle up, trying to catch another glimpse of golden hair.

“Mouse, are you busy nibbling at some cheese? Come on, we have to get going before a cat finds either of us.”

Leorio swears under his breath when that doesn’t get a response either, and he presses his communicator, two quick clicks. It’s a common shorthand code the entire Association uses to signal to pay attention to your comms. If Kurapika ignores it now…

(He thinks, perhaps helplessly, of another silence, of waiting and waiting until tension was razor-sick in his chest, clawing him open and bloody from the inside out as he _waited_ and trusted and heard nothing until it was too late.

He can’t be too late.

He can’t do this again, he can’t have already made this mistake. Surely, Kurapika is just-

Surely, Kurapika is fine.)

“Rat? Come in.”

Nothing.

No answer at all. And all those misgivings Leorio had shoved down about Kurapika’s lack of teamwork, his tendency to go dark for no reason, come rising back to the surface. His breath is light and fast. His head spins.

No, Leorio realizes suddenly. Not no reason.

He scans the balcony in front of him intensely. No one moving, which is good because _shit_ , he has to get in there _now_ , because the only thing that has ever moved Kurapika beyond the point of reason is-

Just as he thinks that, Leorio hears the first sharp barks of gunfire.

“Kurapika answer your _god_ damn comm!” Leorio hisses. Panic slams his heart against his ribs, ungentle as a meat tenderizer, and Leorio waits for the span of two breaths before he decides _fuck it_. White, anxious electricity spurs him up, has him slinging Kurapika’s rifle over his shoulder as Leorio evaluates the space between the two buildings and takes leave of his senses.

He breathes in one more time.

Takes a running start and-

Jumps.

 

* * *

 

The glass shattering is not the most circumspect of entrances but Leorio figures that plausible deniability has been blown out of the water already and pays it no more mind. Kurapika isn’t answering and from the quiet chatter in the background, Zepile and Senritsu aren’t hearing him either.

“Anything?” he asks them, hauling around a corner.

“Nothing but down,” Zepile says, tension clear in his voice. “Just keep going down for now, Boar, that’s the last place we heard him.”

“Don’t these things come with trackers in them?”

Senritsu chimes in. “If he was left alone with his, then it’s probable that Kurapika modified the locator portion to be optional. He values his independence.”

“He should value his fucking _skin_.” Or maybe Leorio’s nerves or something like that. It’s a long shot, but it’d be _nice_. “Zeps, are those shoes automatic trackers?”

“No, you have to activate it,” Zepile says regretfully. “They ran out of fluid too quickly if we did it any other way. Not to mention how much they cut down on your traction.”

Damn. Process of elimination it is, then.

The moment Leorio enters the third room from the left, one floor down, after frantically checking every door that came before, he rapidly learns three things.

One, there is a very dead body on the ground.

Two, Kurapika is nowhere to be seen, but it is almost certainly his handiwork.

Three, the group of guards he has just stumbled across are, contrary to every nature documentary that has sent Leorio to sleep for the past year, not more scared of him than he is of them. More’s the pity. They have their guns aimed at Leorio in an instant.

“Ah fuck,” says Leorio.

“Put your hands in the air! Did you do this?”

Oh that's a new one. Leorio's learned a fourth thing: they apparently don’t know where Kurapika is either. Flicking his gaze up, Leorio spreads his hands wide, a shake of his shoulders enough to ready the knife in his sleeve for throwing. “Now, now, gentlemen…”

Luckily for him (and unluckily for the guards), Kurapika takes that exact moment to drop from the ceiling. Right on top of one of the guards. Leorio drops one with a thrown knife to the throat and is on the other before Kurapika finishes strangling the man with his thighs.

When he stands up, Kurapika is incandescently furious. “I had this under control, Leorio!”

“No, what you _have_ is a death wish! You could’ve gotten killed! Why didn’t you answer your comms?”

Kurapika snorts, crossing his arms. Twiggy as he may seem in the smooth, carefully tailored lines of his suit, Leorio just saw him choke out a seven-foot tall brick house of a man without breaking a sweat, and he can see the curve of muscles against the seams of Kurapika’s shirt when he does that. “This is why I didn’t want to work with you.”

“Didn’t-“ Leorio sputters a bit, then does it some more for good measure. “The fuck is that supposed to mean, you half-pint murder goblin?”

“I told you to wait outside, didn’t I?”

“I’m not a _kid,_ I’m your _partner_. You can’t just lock me in the car and expect me to stay put.”

Kurapika’s teeth bare in a snarl as he heads out of the room and down the hall. Leorio trails after him. “I would have handcuffed you to the roof if I had known you would pull this shit. The integrity of a plan means nothing to you, does it?”

“I don’t want to hear this from someone whose typical mission reports involve the phrase “Improvised from there” and end with “target deceased by explosion,” okay? You went dark! Was I just supposed to wait?”

Kurapika rolls his eyes hard. “You were supposed to let me _handle it_ , Pig. We’re here to find a trackable trail, some information we can use to get close to the Phantom Troupe’s location and actually take them down. Not just stop whatever leg of the spider this is.”

Odd metaphor. Leorio toggles his glasses into heat-vision mode, swearing at the brightly-lit clump of heat ahead of them. More guards. “Isn’t this just supposed to be a medical supply building? One that’s trading a bit below board? Why would they have info on the Troupe?”

“They have the facilities to deal in body parts. What not misappropriate a few resources here and there for the right price?”

“Because it’s keeping those resources from those who actually need them?”

Kurapika is silent a moment, their footsteps echoing through the hall. “You have too strong of a moral compass for this line of work.”

“Funny, you’re not the first person to tell me that.”

“You have a history of not listening very well, then.” Kurapika lets out a short breath, coming to a stop outside of a door. “The Phantom Troupe moving for profit alone is out of line with their MO. They operate on a thrill basis, so the bigger the target and the likelier they are to get caught, the more likely they are to try it. Organ trafficking is out of character for them, but.”

Leorio puts his back to the wall on the other side of the door. Looks over. “But?”

Face half-lit by the hall’s light, Kurapika’s eyes seem very far away suddenly. “But this isn’t the first time they’ve done this.”

Between them, the door yanks open. The three men that step through barely have time to react before Leorio subdues one of them, the flash of a knife bright in the well-lit hallway. He moves for the second-

Kurapika takes two quick steps, vaulting off the wall like gravity is a concept made for other people and he’s only heard of it in passing. He spins. Lands the toe of his shoe in the men’s jugulars one right after the other on his way to the ground. Blood sprays, and when Leorio spares a glance down, Kurapika is tapping the tip of a hidden blade back into the tip of his shoes.

“How the fuck did you get _those_ past security?”

Snorting, Kurapika grins. “Melody really needs to put Zeppelin through his paces, doesn’t she? They’re custom.”

Leorio’s about to say something when there’s a sharp noise and he’s toppled over.

His ears ring from the collision with the floor. He has a brief moment of awareness, of the shock-startle of heat and weight across his hips and Kurapika’s hand around the back of his neck, before it’s gone and Kurapika snaps off a shot at the next wave of guards. “Time to keep moving,” Kurapika says in a tight voice. “Come on, Pig. Up.”

But Leorio can’t hear him.

Leorio’s hands are covered in red.

He takes stock of himself almost numbly. Pressing here, and there, and over here. Nothing hurts.

Nothing hurts, which must mean the blood came from Kurapika.

He lifts to his knees, reaching out a shaking hand. He knows he’s still out in plain view from the door. Anyone looking through could see him and end him, but the knowledge feels somehow distant. Unimportant in the face of the fabric rapidly soaking with blood, trailing down Kurapika’s side and hip and leg. “Hey, are you-“

Kurapika swears. He grabs Leorio by the forearm, forcing him out of the next line of bullets and up against a wall. Leorio yelps as Kurapika gets a handful of his hair and _yanks_ , but it centers him, pulling the grey away from the corners of Leorio’s eyes.

“Don’t just sit there! Be useful!”

Leorio swallows. “But you-“

“You’re trying to help? You’re trying to keep me safe and get us both out of this alive?” Leorio nods sharply after each question, and Kurapika bares his teeth in his face. “Then stop getting so caught up in your head and actually _do something_. If you go in bumbling around without paying any attention, you’re putting me in more danger than if you just sat and cowered behind this wall the whole time!”

Ah.

“If you don’t want to get shot, then stay  _still_. If you don’t want _me_ to get shot, then get up and come _on_ ,” Kurapika barks, and for once, it’s an order Leorio can follow.

Kurapika swears, ducking into the room. He darts to the nearest line of cover. Gets a few quick shots off that have his mouth set in a grim line. Leorio follows, hands shaking, still circling the fact that Kurapika is bleeding, here, right in front of him and he needs to do _something_ -

This is a medical supply facility.

And they are surrounded by cabinets.

Leorio finds a small suture kit while Kurapika concentrates on clearing the space for them. The sooner they get out, the sooner they can rendezvous, and Leorio won’t have to hear Zepile’s tense voice narrating everything. He won’t have to hear the labored rasp of Kurapika’s voice. They have to secure the best way out. And between the two of them, Kurapika is the most skilled at combat.

Crawling forward with the kit in his teeth, he evaluates the space around him. Around Kurapika. Neither are ideal for what he needs. This whole situation isn’t exactly ideal to treating a bullet wound, though, so he’ll have to suck it up. Most importantly, there’s no room to call Kurapika over here. Leorio swears quietly around the med kit in his teeth before he drops it and shoves it hard across the floor until it skitters to a stop between Kurapika’s legs. “Hey, do me a favor, will you?” he says, praying for himself in the safety of his own mind because this is  _nuts_. “Don’t move.”

Kurapika’s eyes cut to him for the barest, baffled moment before he refocuses, snapping off two shots one right after the other. “What-“

And then, because Leorio is crazy and has left behind all semblance of trying to look after himself, he follows the path of the med kit, squirming and angling between Kurapika’s spread knees to not knock Kurapika’s aim off as Leorio wedges himself between the counter and Kurapika. He reaches up with one hand, searching his kit blindly with the other. Warmth pools over his questing fingertips, wet and red, and Leorio bites back another muttered curse as he pushes Kurapika’s shirt out of the way.

“I know I like to call you Pig, but can’t this wait?” Kurapika asks, voice tight.

A bullet pings off the counter near Leorio’s head, but he doesn’t fucking flinch. He doesn’t dare to, not with the bandages in his hands and Kurapika trying to exsanguinate right in front of him. In between the sharp rapports of the bullets, he says, “Could wait. It’d be a lot harder to keep you alive that way, but I could wait.”

There’s a pause. Leorio looks up, meets Kurapika’s gaze steadily. Bandages are ready in one hand and he has the wound exposed with the other, and on either side of his hips, Kurapika’s legs tremble with the continued force of keeping him steady and upright. Staying like this is probably hell on his knees. Another shot rings out. Kurapika ducks, then gasps as the motion must pull on his wound.

Leorio braces him, grip firm on his hip.

A deep breath.

“No stitches,” Kurapika orders before he straightens again.

Those would have to wait, Leorio admits. His hands are definitely not steady enough to make a good attempt on them right now, especially not with the way Kurapika twitches and adjusts now and then for the gunshots. Applying steady pressure is hard enough. Leorio takes a solid breath, then starts wrapping Kurapika’s torso.

Good enough, he decides. It’s not going to get any better here, anyway. And for that matter-

He taps Kurapika twice on the hip. “Shift, I have an idea.”

“That’s a goddamned first,” Kurapika says, but ducks down and lifts one of his legs so Leorio can scoot back out without having to get up close and personal again.

Leorio kindly chooses not to respond and instead busies himself with his tie clip. A press here, there, and a _twist_ just so, and Leorio lobs it over their makeshift barricade. There’s a quiet clatter, easily missed in the raucous gunfire. And then a hiss. A short _fwoom_. Leorio taps Kurapika’s shoulder as they’re encased in smoke, makes a point to put Kurapika’s hand on his shoulder (and then on his hip a moment later when he spares a thought about how poorly that’s gonna work).

“Go left, Boar,” Melody instructs, iron steady. She’s in full business mode. “There’s a parking garage one floor down.”

Brilliant. Leorio changes trajectory immediately, urging Kurapika along. “Are we leaving a trail?”

Kurapika makes a soft, pained sound when he twists his head to check, and Leorio’s hand tightens on his hip. “Not enough of one to be found once they get out of that smoke. Not if we move fast enough.”

Grimly, Leorio lengthens his stride. “They won’t be getting out soon.”

“Oh?”

“Sedative in the gas. It’s best not to take chances.”

Kurapika laughs. Only a little, and the sound is cut short by the fact that he can’t inhale properly and Leorio is using all of his breath hustling them down the stairs. Leorio doesn’t waste time trying to pick a particular car, shattering the window of the first car he sees. By this point, Kurapika’s skin is ashen. His side is still soaked with blood, Leorio’s bandaging a temporary stop-gap measure.

Leorio lowers Kurapika into the car, gets in the driver’s seat and starts hotwiring. His hands are steady, steady, steady, and Leorio isn’t thinking about the unsteady warmth of Kurapika braced against his side. “Zepile. Directions to the safe house. _Now_.”


	4. until the evening gets late (and I'm alone with you)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Was that a comment about my character?”
> 
> Snorting, Kurapika’s eye opens lazily, still shining with that odd sheen from his contacts. “Figures you’d know how to tell you’re being called a pervert in another language.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have absolutely nothing to say for myself, except like, y'know, hi hello, how are you all.
> 
> content warnings in here for a rather frank discussion of kurapika's history with the troupe. canon typical, but there are some implications of a rather unbalanced and unhealthy relationship between kurapika and chrollo between the lines. it's spoken of rather vaguely and its decidedly in the past, but i'd rather you all be careful if that will be something that upsets you.

Leorio shoulders open the door to the safehouse with more force than grace, the wood sticking as it scrapes past the frame, and he’s never been so glad to see a dusty, yellowed hallway than he is right now. The come-down of adrenaline still has him shaky, his breath rushed through his lungs, but he can’t- focus, focus, Paladiknight, because he has a patient on his hands.

“I almost regret not letting you give me stitches earlier,” Kurapika says against Leorio’s side. “I liked this jacket and it’s got blood all over it. Had all my pockets.”

“Yeah? What’s in your pocket’s that’s so important?” Leorio asks. He’d be gentle about hauling Kurapika to the small bathroom at the end of the hall but he’s past the point of care, and Kurapika is probably past the point of feeling it anyway. Kurapika’s been bleeding steadily for the last half-hour as Leorio wove through traffic, leaving their stolen car a block and a half from here with full intention of driving it into a nearby reservoir as soon as Kurapika is stable. But stability requires medical care, and the bullet wound is worse than Leorio originally thought.

“Knives,” Kurapika hisses as Leorio lowers him into the tub. “My favorite ones.”

That tracks. Kurapika’s the sort to have favorite knives, and right now, Leorio wishes that fact didn’t make him a little fond. Priorities, Paladiknight. Focus. He digs out a ready stocked kit from beneath the sink, immediately grabbing a handful of gauze cloths. Fold, press. Kurapika winces as Leorio applies pressure to the wound.

“Hey,” Leorio murmurs, pressing another cloth to the wound. “Stay with me here. Hold this. I have to cut off your shirt.”

Kurapika mutters something in a liquid tongue that Leorio doesn’t quite catch, but Kurapika’s hand comes to shakily press on top of Leorio’s so he clings to the hope that Kurapika understands.

“Was that a comment about my character?”

Snorting, Kurapika’s eye opens lazily, still shining with that odd sheen from his contacts. “Figures you’d know how to tell you’re being called a pervert in another language.”

Leorio finishes getting his shirt off. No time to be distracted by all of Kurapika’s skin, the light slash of his blonde hair glimmering in the light. Not when some of it is dark and matted with blood. “I know all the important things. Like, for instance, asking where the hospital is, knowing if someone’s insulting me or my mother, and drinks. And medicine. Any allergies?”

“Patriotism, capitalism, and common sense.”

“None for medicine then. Good. You can get the good stuff.”

“You know, when they told me you were skilled in triage, these are not the circumstances I imagined finding out exactly _how_ good you are,” Kurapika admits. Leorio looks up from the soft curve of Kurapika’s elbow where he’s carefully feeling out a vein. Maybe just a little… over there. Ah, yes. There it is.

“Well maybe,” Leorio retorts as he marks the vein’s location with a marker before holding it unceremoniously in his teeth, words coming out awkwardly around it, “you shouldn’t’ve gotten shot so much. Then neither of us would be learning so much about each other. Hey, what’s your blood type?”

“AB positive. Why?”

Leorio whistles lowly between his teeth. “Lucky. That’s the first thing you’ve ever done that’s made my life easier.”

Kurapika rolls his eyes, seems to reconsider that as a bad move, then covers them carefully, mouth screwing up. Probably dizzy as fuck, poor guy. Leorio pulls out a roll of tubing and a set of needles. Kurapika glances down, then studiously covers his eyes again, fist curling into a tight ball. His voice does not shake as he says, “Why would I ever aim to make your life easier, Piggy?”

“Gee, I dunno, but it seems like you’re no better at making that shot than any other. Maybe because I’m your partner and partner’s work together? Does that sound like it?”

“No, can’t say that it does.”

“Well, fuck.” Leorio inserts the needle, taping it in place as soon as he gets to a good depth. Then, he just disinfects his own arm and-

As though something occurs to him, Kurapika frowns. “Hang on, where are you getting blood to do a transfusion?”

“Universal donor sitting right here, sweetcheeks. Just lay back and relax. You’re gonna be okay.”

“If you fucking call me that again, I’ll kill you myself,” Kurapika swears, and then promptly passes out.

“Well alright then, sweetcheeks,” Leorio murmurs. He gets the other end of the tube and holds his arm out. “Guess you’ll have to wake up to do that, so you’d better hang in there.”

 

* * *

 

Kurapika sleeps.

For hours, it is just Leorio and his frantic heartbeat, the long letdown of adrenaline, the stale taste of fear as he paces the hall, one hand tucked against the crook of his elbow where he is needle-bruised and swollen. Silence rings in his ears and nothing quells it. Sitting beside Kurapika helps in the moment, as does hearing from a subdued Zepile and Senritsu, delivering an update that they would be extracted in a few hours.

But the safe house is achingly still.

Leorio rewraps bandages, disposes of his used sharps and bloodied clothes, boils water for tea, gives up on tea after a frustrated search through the cabinet’s reveals only molded coffee grounds and a broken mug. Some safe house. At least the fridge is better stocked, but there isn’t much for Leorio to do with his hands while he waits.

Another beat.

Two.

Leorio’s ears ring with ringing, aching pressure, and he retreats to the bedroom again, where at least he’ll have Kurapika’s steady breathing to keep the silence away.

 

* * *

 

“-io?”

Kurapika’s voice jolts him awake, and Leorio hurriedly rights himself, hissing as his head throbs. Fuck. Fuck, he hadn’t meant to sleep, hadn’t meant to leave Kurapika hanging in the balance like that, but all Kurapika is doing is blinking at him slowly, eyelids slightly out of sync as he dazedly watches Leorio scramble upright.

No light leaks in through the windows, and a quick glance at his watch tells Leorio that it’s still hours before even predawn starts. He’s been asleep for all of thirty minutes. His hands feel numb. Disconnected. Every muscle has locked up on him.

Shake it off, Leorio.

“You have terrible bedside manner,” Kurapika rasps at him. “Aren’t you supposed to offer me ice chips or something? Or at least wear something nicer. You could’ve changed, you know.”

“Is this when we discover your nurse kink?” Leorio presses his fingers against Kurapika’s thin wrist as he kneels beside the bed, frowning down at his hands in lieu of meeting Kurapika’s eyes. His pulse is nice and steady. A good contrast to how Leorio’s gallops. “Why Mouse, and here I thought you were a gentleman.”

“The only gentle thing here is you.”

Leorio glances up sharply at that. Kurapika seems a little concerned about what he just said, lips pursed in what Leorio would tentatively call a pout if he didn’t believe that even thinking it would get him a knife to the thigh. “No time to change yet,” Leorio says instead of anything else. “I was keeping an eye on you.”

Kurapika’s eyes flutter shut. “By keeping your eyes closed? Very secure, Leorio.”

The curl of his name along Kurapika’s tongue has heat clenching in Leorio’s stomach, and he pushes it aside with a forced laugh. “Oh, did the drugs remind you what my name is?”

“I’m mostly surprised the anesthetic wasn’t expired. Did you know that it expires? Found that out when I had to give myself stitches one time. Biting a belt and screaming doesn’t stop your hands from shaking.” Kurapika runs his tongue over his lips like he isn’t quite sure they’re still there. Leorio watches with a normal amount of interest, curious about how the anesthesia is working. “I can only half-feel my mouth.”

“That’s pretty normal. I gave you the good stuff.”

“Should’ve just left me.”

“I wasn’t going to leave you to die.”

Grey eyes flutter open. It’s almost endearing how much effort Kurapika puts into focusing on Leorio’s face. “I know that. But it doesn’t matter all that much. I’m still going to die once we’re done.”

Leorio frowns. “What do you mean?”

And in a calm, almost daydreamy voice, Kurapika says, “I plan to take my own life to atone for those I’ve taken, obviously.”

_Obviously?_

What the fuck is obvious about that?

“Hey what the fuck?” Leorio says. “What the fuck kind of plan is that?”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Leorio, but while I may be _good_ at what I do… I don’t enjoy it. I kill people because it keeps me alive and because it will avenge my family. When I’m done… am I supposed to live with what I’ve done? Sweep it under the rug and forget all about it? I’m a blade that’s been honed to a single purpose and when that purpose is done, I’d rather be snapped in half than left to rust.”

“Man, I really must have given you the good shit if you’re off making metaphors like that.” Leorio scrubs his hand across his short hair, then trails his hands up. He hesitates here and there in the dark, dithering until Kurapika sighs and takes his hand in cool, callus-rasped fingers and just holds on. “Is it the Phantom Troupe, specifically? That you’re after?”

Kurapika’s pulse is fast but solid in his fingers, beats that Leorio _feels_. “Yes. Once I’m through with them… It’ll be over.”

“This is pretty personal for you, huh?”

“They killed my family, Leorio.”

Leorio swallows, his throat tight, once, twice. “Tell me about it?” A gentle question.

It seems like Kurapika isn’t going to answer at first. And then he lets out a long breath that catches at the end. There’s a shift in the darkness, the glint of Kurapika’s eyes catching the moonlight as he rolls onto his uninjured side. Curiously, he does not dislodge his grip on Leorio’s hand.

And then Kurapika tells him the whole gritty history of it.

He is quiet and dispassionate, a recitation of a history that belongs to someone else, but Leorio knows that the distance is something Kurapika has done to protect himself, can feel the still-alive heartbreak seeping into every word. The Phantom Troupe killed his entire family. Had harvested their organs for sale, particularly their eyes due to a unique coloration that occurred in them. Was neither gentle nor considerate about it and had left a twelve year old Kurapika, who had been the last to leave the house, who had left the door unlocked, to discover their bodies with no care as to the state they were in. It was gruesome, to put it mildly.

But, Kurapika says, voice tight, that isn’t… all.

Because Kurapika had wanted revenge. Had studied, had sharpened himself to a fine point, had learned every skill of tracking and blackmailing and lethality through repetitive practice like the breaking of a bone. Had followed the Phantom Troupe through any means necessary.

Had found them.

Had joined them.

Leorio looks at Kurapika with surprise, but Kurapika is already waving him off. “It wasn’t-. It was infiltration. A cover. I was trying to get close to their leader. He thought I was…” and his mouth twists. “Interesting.”

“So it worked?”

A pause. Kurapika’s eyes are flat and distant, seeing something Leorio can’t. “A little too well. Chrollo took a shine to me. I… I don’t know if he knew I was there to kill him, but I’m positive that he didn’t care either way. He just wanted to see what he could do. Like a child with a doll. A god with an ant. I kept disrupting missions, trying to frustrate him. It worked. He got frustrated. But it also got the Association’s attention. Melody, though I didn’t know it at the time, started following me, and one time when I did act out, I made contact with an agent from the Association.”

Leorio’s breath catches. His eyes have adjusted enough that he catches the slow sweep of Kurapika’s lashes against his cheeks. He can hear his heart pound. His knees ache, but he doesn’t dare move.

“That agent,” Kurapika says, soft, deadly, “was Pietro.”

(This part Leorio knows. Leorio was on the outside with a gun in his hand and his voice in Pietro’s ear. Pietro had come across an enemy agent but had started talking, easy and smooth in his low-country drawl the way he did, and it worked, because of course it did. Pietro had talked his way over to the agent, had signaled Melody because Senritsu had been keeping an eye out for this particular Spider.

They had separated. The Spider was going to a rendezvous point. Leorio was in Pietro’s ear, joking with him that of _course_ Pietro could charm even the enemy. Leorio was on his way in. Back-up for a large room probably full of enemy agents. Pietro would need another pair of hands.  

The comms went quiet.

Leorio was too slow.

If he had stayed on the roof, had kept his eyes out the way he should have, he probably wouldn’t have missed the other Spiders coming into the building, heading straight for Pietro’s exit route.)

But Melody had gotten the Spider. Melody had gotten to Kurapika and gotten him out, and there was a lot still untold that Kurapika had to recover from, but that was the base of it all. Kurapika had lived and joined the Agency and Leorio had been too slow to keep the one good thing in his life safe.

“I owe my life to many others,” Kurapika says simply. “When I’m done, it will essentially be useless, won’t it? What other good will I do aside from laying my ghosts to rest beside me?”

Leorio –

-doesn’t know how to answer that. Can’t, even in the quiet dark, with Kurapika’s blood on him and still pulsing strong beneath his fingers. He slides his free palm up Kurapika’s side, feeling the heat of his skin. He swallows.

“Most people would take that as a reason to keep living,” Leorio says into the silent dark. “To live in their stead.”

Kurapika blinks at him. Another slow sweep of moon-pale lashes. “Most people are braver than I am in every way that really matters, Leorio.” Then, softly, “I never said that I was sorry. About your partner. He was a good man.”

Leorio’s throat works and works and works. “He was the best of men.”

There is a heavy beat of understanding, of this shared regret coming to the same point from different angles that Leorio swallows like a shard of glass. A breath in. Out. Kurapika’s fingers curl almost delicately in Leorio’s.

“Leorio-” Kurapika starts just as Leorio says, “We should get some sleep before extraction-”

They both stutter a stop. Leorio tightens his grip on Kurapika minutely. Enough to be felt. Not enough to be a trap.

Leorio has his hand around the curve of Kurapika’s hip, and Kurapika shakily breathes out again, a whimper of breath as he whispers, “Leorio,” on the faintest edge of being audible. He rolls onto his side. Leorio holds very, very still as Kurapika slides his hand into Leorio’s short hair. A warm breath of air against his mouth as Kurapika stops, their noses side by side, and Leorio can’t be sure if he really feels the brush of shaking lips or if he wants it badly enough to trick himself.

“Kurapika. Is this a good idea?”

“As good an idea as any,” Kurapika says against his mouth. “Let me have this much for myself, Leorio. Please.”

They come together, gentle as Leorio guides them into the kiss, dry and close-mouthed at first. Misaligned so that Leorio kisses Kurapika’s upper lip more than his full lower one. Realign. Kiss. Again and again, until Leorio’s entire pulse is narrowed down to his sensitive lips and the way Kurapika’s hip feels like a brand beneath his palm. Kurapika keeps making these little sounds into Leorio’s mouth, hazy and wanting. Levering himself up, Leorio leans over Kurapika-

-Or would, if his knees didn’t seize. He stumbles instead, catches himself roughly on the bed, just barely managing to keep himself from falling on a laughing Kurapika. Swearing, Leorio hovers for a few seconds before giving it up as a fucking bad job. A few nudges has Kurapika shifting with a hiss as Leorio slides into the bed beside him. Close enough to kiss still.

Leorio steals a few more soft kisses but the urgency is gone. Kurapika cups his cheek, deliberately rasping his stubble, and opens for him sweetly, his eyelashes fluttering even as the kisses slow down to something honey-sweet and lengthy. Gentle, purposeless explorations of the way every node on Leorio’s body lights up in contact with Kurapika’s whipcord strong frame.

“Is that all?” Kurapika murmurs.

Leorio pokes him in the side. Kurapika full-body flinches, but makes no sound. “For now, yeah. We do need sleep before extraction. And I guarantee that what I want to do to you would break your stitches already.”

Kurapika’s eyes light up a little at that, interested, and Leorio resolves not to ask. With a chuckle, Kurapika settles down. Leorio watches him blink slower and slower until the line of his mouth softens and his breaths come deep. Only then does Leorio curve around Kurapika as closely as he wants to, his shaking hands skimming hip and the divot of waist and the jut of Kurapika’s shoulder blade like the joint of a severed wing.

Sleep seems so far away. It’s alright, though. Leorio can wait, his face buried in Kurapika’s hair, inhaling the steel, blood, and gunpowder smell of him as he watches the window for dawn.

 

* * *

 

The next target is a charity gala.

“It doesn’t seem like it fits the Troupe. Why are we being sent there?” Kurapika asks, hissing when Leorio wipes slightly too hard against his stitches. “A charity gala isn’t their MO.”

“Then it’s a good thing we’re not really going there for _them_.” Leorio grunts and grabs the roll of bandages to wrap Kurapika up again. “We’re going to get information, apparently. Someone who has some insider intel.”

Kurapika hums doubtfully, neither agreeing nor disagreeing. He doesn’t tremble at all, his hands steady on the rapidly reassembling gun parts that are spread before him. Leorio wants to kiss him again, but the morning light had found them on opposite sides of the bed, Kurapika keeping the last bit of watch before Zepile’s extraction arrived. The sheets had been an intraversable distance, the lean line of Kurapika’s back achingly far away.

Now, Leorio is close, but-

Not close enough.

Focus, Leorio.

“And our point of contact is…” Leorio feels his insides curdling, is sure the expression on his face matches the disgust currently setting in his gut. “God, did it have to be Hisoka?”

“Know him?”

Leorio can still feel the phantom sharp drag of teeth on his throat and ear, the too-familiar slide of a hand up the backs of his thighs and inseam. That, and the knife that had been against his neck at the time. He shakes off the sense-memory with a scowl and finishes wrapping Kurapika up, smoothing his shirt over cool bandages and warm skin. “Unfortunately.”

“Good, that means I won’t lose valuable time when the two of you meet again.” Kurapika snaps the cartridge in place, cocking his head at Leorio. “Ready to go?”

“God, there is just no talking to you sometimes,” Leorio grumbles, but he straightens his jacket anyway, setting the cuffs neatly against his pulse.  Kurapika’s gaze is a physical weight on his skin. It itches. “The car’s outside. Let’s get out of here.”

“Don’t embarrass me out there, Leorio.”

“Embarrass _you?_ For that, you’d have to be chemically capable of feeling shame.”

Kurapika lets out a sharp bark of laughter as they head out, and the warmth of that worms its way beneath Leorio’s breastbone. There’s a gentle touch at his sleeve, a tug that brings Leorio to a stop right before he steps through the door. When he turns, Kurapika tilts up, raised on his tiptoes as his lips brush tantalizingly close to Leorio’s own.

Leorio doesn’t breathe.

“I won’t forget, you know,” Kurapika murmurs as he rocks back on his heels. “I haven’t forgotten. Later, we should talk more.”

“Right.” Leorio blinks. Touches the corner of his mouth. “Good. I mean, just. Y’know. Later, we’ll talk.”

He’ll feel that moment of contact for the rest of the day. A tingling patch of skin that Leorio will circle over and over again mentally. But later is a promise that he never expected.

It will have to do.

 

* * *

 

“How will we get in?” Leorio asks, looking over the gala location. The place is swarming with security, just enough guards to make Leorio wary of just walking in. “Or rather, I suppose, how am _I_ getting in, because you’re not allowed any vigorous movements yet, Mister Gunshot Wound. They’re checking invites at the door.”

“So don’t go in through the door.”

“Don’t go in through the door, he says, like that’s something easy,” Leorio scoffs. “Can you magic me in there now?”

“No, don’t be obtuse.” And Kurapika turns to him with a delighted look in his eyes. “I have a plan.”

 

* * *

 

“For the record, this is one of the stupidest things I’ve ever done,” Leorio grumbles, breath misting the window in front of him. God he’s glad it’s late and people don’t like to ask questions or look up. “At least in the top five.”

“I’m honored.”

“You shouldn’t be. It’s a dumbass decision.”

There’s a quiet snort in his ear. “And yet here you are, still doing this. Now, follow my sight. There’s a handhold right up- there. There you go.”

“I mostly don’t see why I have to do this.” He finds the handhold, boosting himself up those bare few inches. The next ledge is close enough that he doesn’t need Kurapika pointing it out, and Leorio swings over, catching his breath. "I mean, you're smaller and arguably more spritely and you always have to get up places to use your guns so-"

Hang on.

Kurapika’s laughing at him, a low chuckle that rasps through their earpieces. Leorio scowls, his wind-chapped lips pulling painfully. “What?”

“Nothing, just. Are you ever even the slightest bit self-conscious about the noises that come out of your mouth?”

“I’m not conscious of anything that comes out of my mouth.”

“That’s very obvious. And you're doing this, Pig, because I told you to."

Damn but that’s a salient point if Leorio’s ever heard one. He huffs out a laugh and pulls himself forward. One step closer. One step closer and closer.

 

* * *

 

“This is stupid.” Kurapika’s voice crackles just a little across the radio and Leorio tries his best to not feel a warm rush of prickling sensation at how _close_ he sounds, even though he’s set up on a rooftop a few buildings away. Line of sight isn’t the absolute best, but it’ll keep him out of trouble now that Leorio’s inside. “I take back everything I said earlier about this being a good plan. If it had been me in there, I would’ve gotten the document by now.”

“And set off how many alarms in the process, Mouse?” Leorio says under his breath, adjusting his cufflinks. The suit had gotten just a little wrinkled in his climb, but it should be fairly acceptable.

Kurapika’s huff is more a rush of static than anything else. “Watch your mouth, Pig. I wouldn’t have set off _any_ alarms.”

“How many dead guards?”

“… only as many as necessary.”

Leorio snorts, covers it by lifting his glass up to his mouth and taking a sip of smooth, bubbling wine. “If we do it my way, no one ends up dead.”

“Just bored.”

He wants to continue arguing, wants to keep up this lighthearted, easy rapport that he and Kurapika have going on, because despite the vitriol in the nicknames, Leorio is having _fun_. But he has to focus too. Hisoka is nowhere to be seen here, which must mean that he’s further inside the building. Lurking, probably, as he’s wont to do.

“How are you going to get in from here, Piggy?” Kurapika’s voice curls with amusement. “I have a few suggestions if you’re lost.”

“I’m sure you do. But watch an _actual_ infiltration master work.” Leorio adjusts his coat, nabbing a syringe from the lining as he does and carefully attaches a needle. Then he moves with purpose, sliding between mingling guests until he finds a lady, surrounded by guards. He sends a brief mental apology for what he’s about to do skyward, palms the syringe, and surreptitiously injects her.

When the poor girl’s eyes flutter and she sags, Leorio is right nearby to catch her in his arms. It’s criminally (hah) easy to let his voice go deep and insistent, sharp in the way that gets people to pay attention as he calls for air, for a doctor, for “you, there, show me somewhere she can rest away from all of these people.”

In his ear, Kurapika makes an interested noise.

Leorio is brought to a small back room. He makes a show of carefully laying the lady down and checking her over before sighing with relief. “She’ll be okay.”

“You sure?” one of the guards asks.

Leorio reaches into his suit with studied nonchalance, fast enough that the guard tenses, giving Leorio plenty of reason to shoot him an incredulous look as he pulls out an ID with his name on it. “I’m a doctor at a hospital in Yorknew. I hope I’d be sure.”

The guard takes his ID with a fair amount of skepticism that relaxes the more he inspects it. Then, he turns to his partner. “I’m gonna go run this. Don’t move. My partner will guard the door.”

“Mm, alright. Make it fast. And I’d still contact an ambulance to get her to a hospital. She may have just fainted, but there may be complications.”

The hustle and bustle of paramedics coming around allow Leorio ample time to take a left down the closest hallway, following directions to a nearby set of vents. He shoots a disgruntled look towards the nearest window less out of any real hope that Kurapika can see him and more to express his discomfit before sighing gustily and setting about getting the cover off with a few grunts and a twist of the screwdriver built into his watch.

Kurapika hums. “Is that medical license actually real?”

“Of course it is.”

“ _Of course_ , he says, like it’s actually _of course_ in our line of work. _My_ medical license isn’t real.”

“That’s because you don’t know how to _commit.”_  Leorio says with a sharp exhale on the second syllable, hoisting himself into the vents not a moment too soon. The sound of footsteps echoes up and Leorio carefully wedges the cover back into place.

“I commit just fine! You’re just a moron who decided that getting a degree was worth the exhaustion when you’re also an international agent.”

Leorio shrugs. Wriggles a little further into the vent. “I got bored on the weekends.”

Kurapika makes a disgusted noise. “You know what I did when I got bored on the weekends?”

“Killed people?”

“I-, Not-,” Kurapika stops himself a couple of times before clearing his throat a little awkwardly. “I was going to say that I broke up black market trade rings.”

Huh. Leorio crawls on through the dark. He makes sure to keep his voice low. Sure, there’s a party going on and people are always explaining away the strange noises they hear, but he already has enough to worry about when he’s trying not to thud around or, heaven forbid, get stuck. “And that didn’t involve killing anyone?”

“It mostly involved ingratiating myself to the mafia and spending all of their money instead of my own to ruin an auction,” Kurapika admits. Then, “You know I do try to _avoid_ killing people, don’t you?”

“Unless it’s the fastest way in.”

“Even then, I don’t-. If it’s _necessary_ , I-“

“Shh, Mouse. I’m getting somewhere.” One more room, Leorio’s pretty sure. He’ll be right outside of-

And then the floor promptly falls out from underneath him. Leorio lands with a grunt, rolling quickly to get his feet under him. Coming up to a crouch, he stops when he spots gold heels. Traces them up smooth calves and a long, lean body clothed in loose, suggestive clothing to a pale, pale face and a pair of deeply amused golden eyes.

“Why hello, Leorio,” Hisoka purrs. “Thank you ever so much for dropping in.”

**Author's Note:**

> feel free to yell at me on twitter @zenellyraen


End file.
